Never Grow-Up
by RonnieTheAwesome
Summary: Michelangelo over hears a conversation and makes a vow to himself to change. For his brothers. I am Re-writing this story seeing as i have learned alot in the few months I've been gone. I want to give you quality material than fast material.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: _This is a thing I have been working on for a while. _ _**I have, for once, gotten a good english teacher. Now I have a lot more experience and I would like to touch up this project to give you more presentable content.**_

**Enjoy!**

Setting: In TMNT 2012 universe

"BOOYAKASHA!" Michelangelo shrieked his signature battle cry as he, alongside his brothers, charged an oncoming wave of Foot soldiers. Each brother stood close before sprawling across the rooftop, taking down foot left and right. Mikey glared before four enemies advancing towards him at once. A mischievous smile graced his lips as he ran at them roasting and and mocking the enemy.

"Four against one, that doesn't seem very fair. Lucky for me I'm fighting a bunch of easy buttmunches!" Mikey's unrelenting teasing successfully enraged his adversaries, causing them to lose focus, dulling every attack, rendering them unsuccessful and lacking. Mikey took all four down with ease.

"Heck yeahs, Man! VICTORY DANCE!" Mikey chanted, breaking into dance. Seeing as he was too busy dancing, he failed to notice the katana wielding Foot Ninja coming up behind him. Raphael (paying attention) grabbed the Ninja by the neck and threw him off the roof.

"Mikey! How many times have we told you?! No celebrating until the fight's over!" Raphael scolded.

"How many times have _I _told _you, _I thought the fight was over!" Michelangelo quipped back. Raph proceeded to smack Mikey upside the head and Mikey whined, per usual. Mikey stood there rubbing the back of his head as his brothers walked past him, shaking their heads in disappointment. Mikey shrugged his shoulders and happily skipped behind his brothers.

When they arrived at the lair after an awkwardly silent walk home, Mikey double front flipped into a beanbag and heard his stomach roar. "Man, I'm starved!" Mikey exclaimed. "Hey Leo?" he asked turning around to look at his brothers. He cocked an eye ridge at his brothers silent conversation with each other. Leo finally turned his eyes towards his little brother and sighed.

"Yes Mikey?" Leo asked as if exhausted.

"Can we get pizza?" Mikey asked with a smile.

"Yeah, just order it and go wait." Leo answered in a bored tone. Mikey noticed but chose not to question it. The happy turtle called Antonio's and got his usual before sprinting down the sewers. He ran for a minute before he slowed down and realized he forgot money. Mikey facepalmed and ran back to the Lair, about to enter until he heard what his brothers were talking about.

"He's such an idiot! Does he not realize he almost got himself killed! Again!" Raphael fumed.

"I wouldn't go that far but he has been quite annoying lately." Donnie added.

"Michelangelo has been nothing but reckless and bothersome lately. He needs to change. He needs to grow up." Leo preached. Raph and Donnie nodded in agreement. Mikey backed away from the entrance and sprinted in the other direction with tears in his eyes. _Why would they say those things? _Mikey wondered. _Am I really that annoying? Do I just get in the way? Am I putting my brothers' lives at risk? _Michelangelo thought and thought about this as he came to an abandoned septic tank and sat against the wall with his knees against his chest.

"Yes." He whispered. All of these questions and all of these thoughts came to one conclusion. Yes, I am that annoying. Yes, I do just get in the way. Yes, I am putting my brothers' lives at risk.

Leonardo was right. He did need to change and it will be for the better.


	2. Chapter 2

Michelangelo got up from the floor, whipped the tears from his face and began to sprint towards the lair, only stopping when he had reached the entrance and paused to listen for signs of on-going conversation. Having heard nothing but the murmur of the television set, Mikey set forward to the kitchen to grab some money from the tin kept on top of the refrigerator. Grabbing it, he set back towards the sewer grate where the pizza was to be delivered. Michelangelo had gotten there not a moment too soon as the tell-tale engine of the pizza delivery-boy's scooter gave a distinct hum before cutting off abruptly.

Mikey whispered to the boy to look down and relished in the confused look he always got. He loved it! It made him feel as if he were a _secret_ agent receiving top _secret _intelligence in a _secret_ location. They completed their transaction as the pizza boy speed off in his Mopet and Michelangelo ran. He arrived at the lair once again and set the pizza down on the kitchen island.

"Pizza's here!" Mikey hollered, now noticing the distinct crack in his voice. He flinched at the sound. He grabbed a slice of pizza and head to his room before his brothers arrived.

Michelangelo has always had exceptional hearing, even when compared to his brothers. so when he saw his brothers leave the dojo and head to the kitchen he picked up on what they were saying.

"Ya think the knuckle-head actually left some for us this time?" Raph joked but it was still a valid question. Mikey cringed and shut his door quietly before sitting in his bed and picked at his pizza. All of the sudden the delicious italian meal seemed to lose its luster as Michelangelo tossed it aside. His pizza slice knocked over a few pizza boxes that had piled in the corner which made him jump. Michelangelo sat up and looked around himself.

The messy room he once saw as a "modern-day Picasso" now seemed disorganized and suffocating. His plethora of action figures and comic books seemed childish and stupid to him now. Michelangelo saw everything differently now that he knew how his brothers felt about him and how he really was. He said he was gonna change, grow up and for his vow to become a reality, he needed to make some environmental changes.

He left his room and sought out for supplies. He grabbed a broom, mop and bucket, an entire roll of trash bags, and some boxes. Michelangelo brought his supplies back to his room and got to work.

All of the pizza boxes and trash: gone; Toys, comic books, and cartoon VHS tapes: Packed away in boxes and shoved under his bed to be forgotten; dirty gear: in a basket to be cleaned; Useless junk and human underwear: Thrown away. Michelangelo swept and mopped his floor as he thought about his commitments and what he was doing really meant, the true implications of his actions. He was throwing his past self away. Every childish aspect of his life was quite literally being abandoned or pushed away or stuffed in a corner and hidden.

Michelangelo meant what he said. He didn't want to get in the way, he didn't want to risk his brothers' lives, he didn't want to be a burden.

He wanted, _needed,_ to grow up.

_**So he did.**_


	3. Chapter 3

Michelangelo stood proud at his job well done before heading back to return his supplies. It was on his journey return the supplies that he caught sight of the clock and realized that morning training was in an hour. _I was cleaning that long? _Michelangelo asked himself as he walked back to his room. It's not like he had time to sleep and he wasn't even the slightest bit tired so Mikey had decided he would try something Leo and Master Splinter had been pushing him to do for years. Meditate.

When they were children and even now, some training sessions are purely meditation and nothing else. Being completely honest, Mikey had always been rather bad at meditation. More times than not, Michelangelo would fall into a deep sleep whilst in the lotus position as his brothers found inner peace around him. Michelangelo sat on the mat next to his bed and eased into the lotus position. He lie with his arms rested on his knees and his palms faced the ceiling.

Michelangelo took deep lingering breaths.

In through the mouth. Out through the nose, repeat.

This cycle continued until He had managed to calm his heart rate to a steady drum. Michelangelo could feel as every muscle in his body began to relax and lose tension as he sank deeper into a meditative trance. Michelangelo soon found himself hyper aware of the energies moving and flowing around him. The could feel every atom flow into and out of his body as he breathed, the busied dust particles that were disturbed by cleaning, every last atomic particle that made up his body, everything he could feel.

He slipped even deeper and lost all feeling of his mortal bod all together as he ascended to something greater. Suddenly, he was standing in a dark room with no walls or ceiling but a reflective floor. No matter where he looked, everywhere seemed to stretch into infinity, and the mirroring floors beneath his feet seemed to amplify the endlessness of it all.

Mikey then looked back down at himself. He seemed normal but somewhat faded with a faint glow outlining his being. Michelangelo moved his hand around in astonishment, studying his changed form of being.

"Woah. Where am I?" Michelangelo asked to noone in particular. He wasn't expecting an answer but nonetheless, he got one from a husky, familiar voice.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

_**A/n: It's been a while huh… I have no excuses. But I do have an apology, I am SO sorry this took so long, I promise updates will happen way more often. I haven't forgotten you, loyal reader! **_

_**I have also touched up the previous chapters seeing as I have learned a BUNCH since I last wrote for this site. So if you want to check It out, it's here. By here I ment like where the old chapters used to be. It's still not too clear but this authers note is already WAY too long so let us voice your thoughts and "Get on with the story already!" ~RONNIE G.**_

"Leo!" Michelangelo called as he spun around to look to his blue clad brother. "Wh- How-?" he stuttered completely dumbfounded before finding solid ground somewhere in his mind to support him in asking his before question once again. "Where am I?"

"Shiva, Little brother," Leonardo answered," You have been taught this before."

Michelangelo responded with a confused expression and tilted head, to which Leonardo's apparition sighed in exasperation.

"_Shiva_ is the higher state of consciousness somewhere between the waking, sleeping, and dreaming states. Here, we know we "are" but we don't know "where" we are. It is this knowledge that I "am," but I don't know "where" I am or "what" I am, that is Shiva," Leonardo explained.

Michelangelo stood silent, trying to comprehend the information bestowed upon him. He understood it, just barely, but still had one remaining question. "How are you here?"

"Ninja would spend years finely tuning their meditative abilities to a point where they could communicate with other ninja in the Shiva. This feat can only be accomplished with two skilled ninja who have trained for years to develop this skill. I, myself, have only just acquired it. So the real question to ask is how are _you- _someone completely new to meditation, a sheer novice- here, Michelangelo." Leo asked his little brother with a pure frustrated yet contemplative gaze in his direction.

_**Novice.**_ Michelangelo repeated the word over in his mind. A complete novice, an inferior ninja.

("_**More truth to be heard from a brother, tearing away the filter of innocence built in the mind of a child living an ever darkening world. A child who refuses to grow up."~**__Ronnie G.)_

Michelangelo looked to his glowing toes before calmly answering his brother's question. "I don't know, Leo. Maybe I'm not as unskilled as you thought... But every team needs an expendable, so I apologize for overstepping my bounds. I pride myself on serving a purpose." Michelangelo Deadpanned, not once looking towards his brother before turning away from him completely. Michelangelo walked away from his brother in an endless direction.

"What?" Leo asked, genuinely confused.

Michelangelo picked up the pace before bringing his palm up to his chest, feeling the muscles constrict as if to protect his wounded heart, before violently bringing it back down to his side like he were throwing down hot coals. This created a large crack in the reflective floor between him and his brother, spreading to create something alike to a bottomless cavern. Michelangelo turned to a terrified brother before taking a deep inhale and a slow exhale before bidding a simple "Goodbye."

Michelangelo opened his eyes to reveal his clean room. This room seemed to bring about it a new, colder vibe. One that felt real for once, felt as if he were seeing the world from new, wide open eyes, like he was viewing the reality for what it really was for the first time. The world was cold.

_The world was Lonely._

_Breakfast. What to make… Eggs maybe? _Michelangelo pulled a dozen eggs out of the refrigerator and heated a greased pan. He made quick work of the eggs, scrambled and sat in a large bowl on the counter, ready for consumption by his hungry family. Like every morning, Mikey put on coffee and hot water for tea and waited for the others.

Leonardo was the first to arrive, perusal, but this morning, in place of this content refreshed grin stood worry. Mikey thought he knew why.

"Mikey, I-," Leonardo was cut off by a sluggish Donatello dragging his heavy limbs into the kitchen.

"Coffee…," Donnie groaned whilst grabbing at thin air in front of him. Mikey offered a slight smile at his genius brother's morning antics before placing a steaming cup of strong, black coffee in the grasping hands. Donnie hummed in content before taking his seat beside Leo. Leonardo's critical gaze never wavered in analyzing his youngest brother.

Finally coming to his own, Donatello felt the tension in the air. Glancing around himself, he observed the odd, lingering silence blanketing the room. Michelangelo was always prattling off about one of his shows or a comic book series he took interest in every morning. Today, on the other hand, Michelangelo seemed… withdrawn, tense, having an unusually high interest in watching their toaster timer. When it popped he jumped. _That's different, _Donnie thought.

Michelangelo turned to set a large stack of toast and butter on the table, still lost on some level of thought. Leaning back up, his eyes met with Dons' and Donnie couldn't help but notice something… _odd. _He couldn't put his finger on it. Something was wrong with Mikey's eyes, like something was missing. He just didn't know _what._

Raphael entered the kitchen, grabbing a bottle of water and helping himself to some food. This little action of normality seemed to snap everyone out of their own minds as everyone began to help themselves.

"Good morning, my sons," Master Splinter greeted his sons whilst making himself Oolong Jasmine tea. Three scattered, gruff "good mornings" echoed back to their sensei, as he sat down to eat. Master Splinter had noticed the lack in sentiment from his youngest son but chose not to question it.

The family of five ate in silence whilst Michelangelo pushed his food around his plate, never looking up or attempting to engage in small talk with his family. The mutants ate as an eerie silence blanketed the group like an unsettling fog with the spiritually absent Michelangelo failing to engage in conversation. Leonardo looked on to his smaller sibling in desperation. He didn't know what to do, what to say, how to 'fix' his little brother. All he knew was that he was no longer in control but he had to work fast.

As time went on, the fiery beauty of Michelangelo's intense personality dwindled to a sombre shadow of what once was. His light that penetrated the dreary darkness of their existence failed to appear and with it, so did the innocence of the providing child.


	5. Chapter 5

_**Donatello's POV**_

_Tick. Tick. Tick. Tick._

The gentle tick of a refurbished clock filled the room, soft humming of nonspecific machinery harmonising with the choppy buffering of a small desk fan added to the atmospheric symphony of my lab. There was something missing though. The energetic caterwauling of my curious little brother.

I always told him to sit still and be quiet, to stop messing with my experiments, (even if on occasion he would make an extreme breakthrough I'd struggle months to accomplish on accident in the space of a few minutes), and to above all stop _annoying_ me. He'd always point and touch asking "What's this for, D? Where does this go? How do you use the spinny thing, Donnie?"

He would always ask what I'm doing and be genuinely interested in what I had to say, even if he would rarely understand. The important thing was that he _tried_ to understand, he wouldn't cut me off asking for "english", he would listen intently with wonder shining in his beautiful baby blues, and wait until I was done to ask for clarification.

I would beg for that kind of disruption about now.

What once was a symphony featuring a chittering Michelangelo is now a foreboding ambience without him. Ticks became constant ringing pain, as if trapped miners hammered away at my skull from the inside, every _tick_ another desperate plunge of their pickaxes against my cranium. The buffer of my small desk fan became thunderous chops from an Apache helicopter and I was far too close to the whirling blades. The soft hum of machines became roaring ocean waves pounding against my eardrums and just like the frigid waves of the Atlantic, the ever growing silence threatened me with relentless, suffocating cold.

I needed my warmth; I needed my _**sunshine**_.

_**FLASHBACK**_

This winter was the hardest yet. Food was scarce, clean water even more so given the hard temperature kept freezing the pipes. For all seven years of our lives, my brothers and I would gather every pillow, mattress, and blanket we could possibly find and pile them all into the pit. It was there we would sleep together, play together, eat together (though mostly sleep), and huddle together for warmth with our warm-blooded father by our sides.

Some nights were easier than others I will admit though understandable, the youngest and smallest of us suffered the most. If he wasn't sick, he was sleeping, and if he wasn't sleeping, he was having horrible nightmares that left him crying and disoriented. He wouldn't sleep much after these nightmares and wept quietly in the dark, praying for reprieve from his own subconscious.

More times than not, i was awoken by my brother's quiet pleas for help and I would (if I could), come to his aid.

"Mikey? Are you okay? Is your tummy hurt again?," I'd always ask knowing damn well that wasn't his problem. I just needed him to talk to me.

"N-No, I'm 'kay," Mike choked the best he could and squeezed his teddy bear tight, hiccuping into its gently matted fur.

"Okay… Do you want to sing with me, Mikey?" I crawled towards him before he even had the chance to give a small, sullen nod and sniffle.

I sat close enough to my little brother to pull his top half over my lap and begin rubbing gentle circles into his carapace, stopping only to trace the geometric patterns of his shell. As always, I began.

"_You are my sunshine, my only sunshine."_ I paused to give Michelangelo the opportunity to contribute. He gave a good, hard sniffle and cleared his throat before continuing.

"_You make me happy when skies are grey," _he sang melodically. I smiled and began to gently rock us back and forth.

"_You'll never know, dear, how much I love you," _I sang in time with our rocking before we joined together and sang:

"_Please don't take my sunshine away."_

_**Present day**_

A small smile graced my lips with the sudden memory of simpler times. My smile disappeared with the thought of my present life. My loving little brother had grown so distant in the past month, speak of his presence became easily mistakable for a ghost story. Sure his physical being was present and accounted for on patrols and during training or at meal times once a day, but his spirit, his fire, his _sunshine _has been nowhere to be seen, often clouded by stoic expression and short deadpanned answers to direct questions. His eyes seemed glossy and unfocused, even when he looked you in the eyes, you could clearly tell he wasn't actually seeing you.

He never came here anymore, my lab I mean. He spent all of his time in his room meditating or in the dojo running kata after kata. He almost seemed to become a Leonardo 2.0 but Leo showed at least some level of expression, mostly worry and frustration these past few weeks but feeling nonetheless. Everytime he looked at mikey, the early worry lines no teen should have became deeper. It became very clear to me that he know something I did not, something to do with Mikey's new found fickle disposition.

Something was wrong, very, very wrong with my beloved younger brother and I needed to get to the bottom of it before we all went insane...


End file.
